Chapter 62#

Gears of Fate 04#

The manual had a total of 30 pages, in a 4-fold size. The first 6 pages were 3 sets of basic part diagrams, followed by 14 component breakdown diagrams totaling 20 pages, and finally the finished product assembly diagram. The content was detailed and rigorous, not at all perfunctory like the teaching just now, and wouldn’t lead to another report.

The only bad thing was—it was too complex. Yu Feichen went to other workbenches to flip through the manuals. Fortunately, everyone had the same machine in their manuals, which meant they could help each other and completion was possible.

Everyone also accepted the reality, flipping through the manuals individually, showing looks of despair as they looked. As for those who rode dragons, flew on swords, wrote epics, or had language barriers, their expressions were as blank as their minds. With only delicate youths and girls present, Classroom 1 was enveloped in the dead silence unique to the atmosphere before a final exam.

Nini raised her hand: “I really don’t know how.”

Xue Xin, the mechanical student, said: “I’ve looked at it too. Although the drawings are difficult, there aren’t actually any highly specialized operations. Broken down, it’s just a combination of some simple components, just like building blocks. Time is limited; let’s all cooperate. Those who know can teach those who don’t. Let’s strive to complete it.”

No one expressed opposition. Yu Feichen said: “Pick the parts first. A few who know how can help.”

Xue Xin and Zheng Yuan came forward one after another, saying they could help. Vincent also came, and finally, Anfield also drifted to the pile of parts.

The drawings specified the model and quantity required for each part; the models were varied, and the quantities were huge. The pile of parts in the classroom was like a vast ocean, and just picking them out was a massive project.

Vincent said: “6 pages of parts. I’ll take two pages, and each of you take one. Pick out samples first and then teach the others.”

He spoke with heavy initial sounds and airy final sounds, which for no reason gave people a sense of being mysterious and eccentric. But there was nothing to fault about the content—except for that “I’ll take two pages.” However, Yu Feichen didn’t say anything. After finishing his own, he could help Anfield find parts; he didn’t think this person was sober right now.

The few of them soon picked all the parts individually and then divided the remaining people into several groups. After a simple teaching session, the others followed them in picking a few corresponding types of parts.

If one person were to pick all the parts, it would undoubtedly be difficult, but if everyone became proficient in a few types and worked only within their range of familiarity, efficiency would be much faster. When one-tenth of the time had passed, all the parts were stacked in separate piles, in sufficient quantities, with some extras.

What to do next was assembly.

There were two paths laid out before them. One was an assembly line, and the other was everyone doing their own.

“13 people, 14 components. Each person can be responsible for one component, making 13, and finally combining them. Or everyone completes their own entire machine individually. Choose one,” Yu Feichen said simply.

Zheng Yuan quickly grasped his meaning and said rationally: “The assembly line method cannot be used. We have too many novices now, and the experienced ones can’t spare time to supervise. Once one person’s assembly has a problem, everyone’s machine won’t be able to be completed. Everyone must do their own; individual responsibility.”

Ling Wei said: “It is indeed inappropriate to drag everyone down for no reason.”

Finally, everyone voted by a show of hands, and everyone agreed to do their own. But that didn’t mean they were left to fend for themselves. The final plan was for the five people who knew how to do it to take turns leading the others at the central workbench, and those who finished first would help those who hadn’t. It was as if a teacher had spontaneously been born from among the students.

Before officially starting, Zheng Yuan used a marker to draw grids on the clock as the final deadline for the production of each part. No waiting for latecomers; once the time was up, even if someone hadn’t finished, they had to start the next one. Time was exceptionally tight, and there was no chance for dawdling. Even Chen Tong, who had the loudest voice, went silent, tinkering with the parts with a serious face.

After starting, Yu Feichen was the first to demonstrate. He didn’t really want to see Anfield, but this guy was sitting right in front of him, tightening screws. He hadn’t recovered from his dizziness yet, his gaze was misty, and his movements were somewhat lazy. Strangely, if the same movement was replaced by the adult Ludwig, it would be nonchalant, arrogant, and lazy; replaced by Anfield, it was like a drowsy fold-eared cat.

People, indeed, only become reliable in adulthood.

Fortunately, everyone was very serious, and no one dragged the team down. Mr. Mutterer was even more of a surprise; despite the language barrier, he had an extremely sharp perception of images. Among the novices, he was actually the fastest. Every time after finishing, he had the leeway to help Nini and Ke An, the two who found it most laborious, so they could barely keep up.

Yu Feichen watched and roughly guessed Mutterer’s native language type—there were no characters or sounds, communicating directly with highly abstract pattern symbols. He had once entered a similar place. In thousands of worlds, strange civilizations are innumerable.

What Xue Xin said was also correct: the complexity of the steam era was not the kind of hard-to-understand complexity. It wasn’t as abstract as physical formulas but was absolutely concrete and accurate. Limited technology could be raised by infinite wisdom; countless simple parts were connected to each other in the most primitive way, eventually forming unimaginably precise structures.

But it was exactly like this that was most terrifying. If one couldn’t learn physical formulas, they’d just give up, but assembling parts was a matter of knowing everything was feasible yet being unable to do it—either hands shaking or being clumsy, always a step behind others.

The entire transmission class was deadline upon deadline, full of narrow escapes. By the end, everyone’s nerves were taut. If it weren’t for Chen Tong’s occasional cursing to relieve the mood, several people probably would have collapsed on the spot.

When the pointer reached the very bottom, Vincent was sitting at Ke An’s workstation, Lilia was holding Anfield and crying, Mutterer was checking the work of the Daoist Ling Wei, and Yu Feichen had just finished the last screw for Nini, who hadn’t kept up with the pace.

—Everyone’s machine was finished.

The sweet broadcast voice rang out: “Class is over! Good work, dear new students~”

Chen Tong wiped the sweat off his forehead with force, and words like lotus flowers came out of his mouth: “F*ck your brother.”

This time, the Daoist Ling Wei did not rebut him.

The broadcast didn’t single anyone out for criticism, nor did it say they hadn’t completed the class task. The whole class was a mess of busyness, and they didn’t have time to see what kind of thing they had actually made. Now, letting out a sigh of relief, they looked at their own works.

“What did we make? How was it put? A simple end device for a transmission machine?”

Bai Song: “Looks like a chair?”

“A chair, probably.”

“It’s just a chair.”

“％#@.”

Backrest, armrests were all there; it was indeed a chair, it’s just that the shape was a bit strange, and the materials… even stranger.

“Motherf*cker, if you want a chair, can’t you just make one out of wood? Doesn’t this waste iron?” Chen Tong was completely irritable.

“No,” Vincent lifted a bar and said: “This is a safety latch. It’s a seat for a roller coaster.”

Yu Feichen had also noticed this during the manufacturing process. He looked at Anfield’s work, then at the others’, confirming that there were no errors in the external appearance. The internal parts were complex and could no longer be checked.

Just then, the broadcast continued: “New students, please bring your class assignments and leave the classroom in an orderly manner~”

The delicate youths and girls dragged the incredibly heavy steel individual chairs out. Fortunately, the floor was smooth, so it didn’t take much effort. They had originally thought the train would be waiting for them in the original place, but the front was empty, with only bare tracks.

“Where to go?”

As if hearing this question, the broadcast rang out again, but this time the voice was even sweeter and stickier than before: “The day’s classes are over. Please obey the academy’s schedule and return to the dormitory in time to enjoy dinner~”

“Hey! At least give a direction!” Xue Xin said.

But there was dead silence.

Yu Feichen, however, pushed the chair to the front of the track. He looked at the distance between the two grooves at the very bottom of the chair and then estimated the width of the metal track—about the same.

Vincent’s expression was also not very good: “The end of the transmission device.”

Chen Tong finally reacted: “…No way.”

However, they had no other path to take; no train, no direction, only the hard requirement of “returning to the dormitory in time.” The only means of transportation was the so-called “class assignment,” a roller coaster seat. Or rather, a miniature “roller coaster.”

Yu Feichen snapped the chair onto the track, and indeed, it fit perfectly.

The group’s faces were deathly pale.

What was even less trustworthy than a roller coaster at an amusement park was a metal roller coaster in a fragment world, and what was even more terrifying than a fragment world roller coaster was only… a roller coaster assembled by one’s own hands.

The dozen or so people snapped their chairs onto the track one after another. Fortunately, they all fit well. Things having reached this point, they could only sit on them. After the safety latch was buckled, a firing pin popped out from the bottom groove. The metal track reacted to the impact, the gears at both ends began to roll slowly, and the gears meshed, bringing the gears on the seat to turn together.

The seat back and seat surface collapsed inward at the same time, fixing the person even more firmly to the chair.

Then, they began to move slowly. At first, it was just moving forward steadily, and then it became faster and faster, the wind howling, and suddenly it turned a large curve!

Screams remained as before, a roller coaster experience no different from the way there, but without any visual obscuration. They were in a precise, huge, terrifying mechanical world, as if traveling in the mouth of a giant beast with many fangs.

Yu Feichen was at the very end, watching everyone’s cars safely pass through a three-hundred-and-sixty-degree elliptical flip-turn. Not bad.

The track was not one road to the end; it had many forks, but certain devices inside the chair could play a role in choosing. The academy didn’t give them a route, but the route was carved inside the machinery.

But an accident happened just like that.

When passing an upward fork, Nini’s scream suddenly changed its tone. Her roller coaster trembled at the fork, rushed toward another direction, and sped forward.

—Oh no.

That forked track wasn’t far before it was another fork. Two seconds later, the bottom gears rubbed, making a violent screeching sound and spraying sparks.

The next second they reached the second fork, there was no selection mechanism inside the roller coaster to deal with this point.

Immense inertia brought the small car to crash into the fork. All the mechanical parts scattered in the air like fireworks, and at the same time, Nini’s body was thrown out. Like a bird that had lost its aim, she was thrown high and then fell down. During the fall, she was first caught by a mechanical arm and then fell vertically down onto a huge brass gear. The gear rotated slowly, meshing with two other gears. The first to disappear into the mesh was her flaxen long hair, then her beautiful lace puffy skirt, and finally her two small buckskin boots.

The machinery still operated slowly. Life disappeared inside it, without even a sound.

The broadcast rang out abruptly: “Number 11, Student Nini, class test—failing~”